I Have Decided to Stand For Election

I have decided to stand for election. As I write this, there are but four days left to apply to be the Labour candidate in Sheffield Hallam, which is Nick Clegg’s seat. This means that, after I make it through the nominations, I’ll be standing against the Deputy Prime Minister in the next general election. It’s as good a place as any to start my long and historic political career, I feel. Go hard or go home, as my debutante grandmother used to say to me, through her tears. VOTE HEAWOOD. The finer points of my manifesto will be ironed out over the next few days but right now it is important to stress that I am quite serious about all the quiet, fiddly details of politics, as well as the power. The everyday details of normal people’s lives are of great concern to me, as is the power. Any long and detailed document produced by the middle echelons of the civil service will be read in full by me, as this will always be of interest, as will the power. But mostly the power. VOTE HEAWOOD. I am prepared for the fact that the House of Commons will not be exactly like Game of Thrones, and that I will be an MP, not a Khaleesi. Despite the chamber having a thing for steely matriarchs, as has been highlighted by all the quasi-sexual tributes paid to Thatcher from ageing Tory gents with bladder complaints, not to mention Jon Snow saying some proper weird shit on Channel 4 about the sound her thighs used to make when they rubbed together, I shall not be referred to as Mother of Dragons. Nor will horses be involved, except when policemen sit on them to protect me from being pelted with eggs. Swords are a thing of the past and I should look instead to effectuate change with the courage of my convictions and the brute force of my rhetoric. Speechwriters will not even be needed, as I plan to convert all the late-night WhatsApp chats with my boyfriend, stored on my iPhone, straight into government policy. VOTE HEAWOOD. Obviously, government policy is going to take some new and dynamic pathways, as our WhatsApp chats tend to involve how long he is going to keep wearing that Christmas jumper, and the details of his seminap daydream in which Tom Cruise figured out he could jump across the whole Atlantic using “crazy maths”. Or whether we can get a signed photo of Michael Buble, and if saying that men shouldn’t cry is like saying that oranges shouldn’t be juiced. Or how long I can keep putting off going to sleep as the baby will be awake in four hours. (She’s not his baby, I just need to remind you of that, lest you mistakenly believe that I am campaigning on the platform of a person with any idea whatsoever of how to organise their own life.) And how the word “per” has made its way into the phrase “as usual” and got stuck inside like an illegal stowaway just coming to this country to scab off our soft touch benefits system or something wait, hang on, no, no, no, VOTE HEAWOOD. Once in power, there will be no expenses scandals from my house, as I plan to move in with Kate Bush in her house on an island in the Thames. Even during the part of the week that I’m supposed to be in Sheffield. Look, it’ll just work out better this way, you have to trust me on this. I’ll be on the island. With Kate. When I am inevitably given a cabinet role, Kate Bush will become my unpaid advisor, attending all cabinet meetings with me and singing, “Oooooh, what a waste of army dreamers,” at everyone. Our online campaigns will be run by Samantha Brick on the Daily Mail website for maximum exposure to everyone who ever dreamed a little dream of being beautiful. I promise to be beautiful for all of us, so you can keep scrolling through your dreams. VOTE HEAWOOD. Inside the House of Commons, I promise not to waste time shouting at the twats on the other side, and using valuable debating hours to prove my own superiority with sneering put-downs. I will do that on Twitter instead. In parliament, I will use my time more generously – to unite us all in one great big love-making session. All of the parliamentarians’ limbs, on all of the floor, all of the time. Ed Balls to the walls. Diane Abbott ready to rumble. Human metronome Michael Gove helping everyone stay in stroke, by reciting the nine times table throughout. Westminster will go off, one hundred per cent Bunga Bunga in the backbenches. VOTE HEAWOOD. Actually, in all honesty, I do know how to defeat our Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg, and it doesn’t even require any of you voting for me. There is an African tribe who give each child a song before they are even born. The mother invents this song when she decides to have a baby, and after she becomes pregnant the song is then sung to the baby, and to the growing child at important moments in their life. By the mother, but also by the whole community. If they ever commit a crime against their community, they are brought to the circle to have their song sung to them, to remind them who they are. It’s not punishment, but a process of bringing one back to oneself. Nick Clegg is in a worse mess than anyone else in British politics because he doesn’t know what he has become. He wasn’t meant to be part of a government that told disabled people to get out of their wheelchairs and push. That sold the hospitals off to their friends’ companies bit by bit, so my pregnant friend who contracted cancer had to wait ages for a scan to locate the tumour because it was tricky to make a booking with the private company who owned the MRI machines. There was actually a time and a place at some point, somewhere, when Nick Clegg definitely, sort of, cared. So don’t even worry about elections. Cancel your kind plans to move to Sheffield for me. I am going to defeat this sad old banquet of a coalition government by cradling Nick Clegg in my arms and singing him his song.

Follow Sophie on Twitter: @heawood

Previously – Ten Things My Kid Won't Believe About 2013